All posts by Brad Whittington

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Should Christians Drink?: The Case for Abstinence

Should Christians Drink?: The Case for Abstinence, Peter Masters, 1992

This one of two books in the list that was published before my 1996 essay. However, in a time before Amazon.com, books published by a small press in the UK were not readily available to geeks in Fred, Texas.

It became apparent after only a few pages that this book is not a dispassionate examination of the subject, but rather propaganda in the purest sense of the word, “the particular doctrines or principles propagated by an organization or movement.” It in no way can stand next to Bacchiocchi’s book as a serious inquiry into the subject, or even next to Libatique’s work, which is bush league at best.

Chapter One established the foundation for a Christian version of situational ethics, destroying the credibility of any statement to follow. For example, when a book argues, as this one does on page 32 regarding the wedding at Cana that, “It is possible that the Lord may have made the wine in a diluted state, ready to serve,” then it is apparent that we’re in the full throes of an agenda fueld by speculation to support a preordained conclusion, not an honest inquiry in search of the facts of the case. I mean, I ask you, “What the heck?” And I use that term advisedly.

The speculations that follow this statement beggar the imagination. It was with great effort that I forced myself to continue, even though I was already one third of the way through the book. It seems that this book, for which I paid $9.99 plus shipping comprises less than 30,000 words. It would seem that a Fred ebook, three times as long for less than a third of the price, is a great bargain!

It was also interesting to see Masters advance a completely unbiblical interpretation of equating weakness in faith with reluctance to embrace legalism, in contradiction to the concepts I discovered and discuss in WWJD. However, I do have to credit him with a very clever conflation of Levitical rules and the priesthood of the believer. It would have never occurred to me to connect those particular dots.

Overall, this skimpy book is short on both volume and substance. Don’t bother with it, especially if you’re looking for a thorough examination of the topic rather than a predictable and boring sermon.

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If by whiskey

A 1952 speech by Noah S. “Soggy” Sweat, Jr., a young lawmaker from Mississippi, on the subject of whether Mississippi should continue to prohibit (which it did until 1966) or finally legalize alcoholic beverages:

My friends, I had not intended to discuss this controversial subject at this particular time. However, I want you to know that I do not shun controversy. On the contrary, I will take a stand on any issue at any time, regardless of how fraught with controversy it might be. You have asked me how I feel about whiskey. All right, here is how I feel about whiskey:

If when you say whiskey you mean the devil’s brew, the poison scourge, the bloody monster, that defiles innocence, dethrones reason, destroys the home, creates misery and poverty, yea, literally takes the bread from the mouths of little children; if you mean the evil drink that topples the Christian man and woman from the pinnacle of righteous, gracious living into the bottomless pit of degradation, and despair, and shame and helplessness, and hopelessness, then certainly I am against it.

But, if when you say whiskey you mean the oil of conversation, the philosophic wine, the ale that is consumed when good fellows get together, that puts a song in their hearts and laughter on their lips, and the warm glow of contentment in their eyes; if you mean Christmas cheer; if you mean the stimulating drink that puts the spring in the old gentleman’s step on a frosty, crispy morning; if you mean the drink which enables a man to magnify his joy, and his happiness, and to forget, if only for a little while, life’s great tragedies, and heartaches, and sorrows; if you mean that drink, the sale of which pours into our treasuries untold millions of dollars, which are used to provide tender care for our little crippled children, our blind, our deaf, our dumb, our pitiful aged and infirm; to build highways and hospitals and schools, then certainly I am for it.

This is my stand. I will not retreat from it. I will not compromise.

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What Would Jesus Drink? ****

**** What Would Jesus Drink?, Brad Whittington, 2011
In 1996 I did a study of all the verses in the Bible that referred to wine and strong drink and it found its way to the Internet under a pseudonym. That essay was quoted in The Year of Living Biblically, was evidently the primary source material of a Relevant Magazine article, was credited by Michael Spencer (RIP) aka The Internet Monk in a 2005 posting, and referenced by dozens of other sites on the internet.
I recently decided to update the essay and released it as What Would Jesus Drink? I released it in digital form as a 99-cent ebook (the lowest price allowed) on Amazon and other outlets. I also made it available in paperback for those don’t do ebooks, also priced as low as the system would allow, which comes out to $7.49. Amazing what going from electrons to paper can do to the price!
You can see the table of contents and read a chapter or so on Amazon. I have to say a big thanks to Hilary Combs for the beautiful front cover and Tosh McIntosh for the designing the rest of the cover and the interior of the book, a huge undertaking.
As I worked on this project, I read some of the books that surfaced in the intervening fifteen years. Most of these were not available when I did the original study, otherwise I probably would not have written my own.
In the next several weeks I’ll review the books I read. I’ll give you a little hint about what is to come. Most of them are against any kind of drinking, and the best book in that category was published in 1871. The anti-drinking book guys who have published in the last two decades could have learned a few things from Rev. William Patton.

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Russo on Writing

“Novelists — especially novelists who paint on a broad canvas — are generally not given to undue anxiety, I think. The task is so enormous that if we ever really thought about what we were letting ourselves in for, we’d never begin. Early on we learn to worry only about what we do today. If I get my two or three pages written on Monday my day’s work is done. It’s useless to worry about Friday or four years from Friday. Pages need our attention; books take care of themselves.” -Richard Russo

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Muffin Man tribute

Norm, technical consultant on the poker scenes in Muffin Man, brought me this gift on New Year’s Eve. In case you can’t tell, that shiny dark thing is a muffin in plastic wrap.
Status report on Muffin Man: Second draft will begin in two weeks. I’m shooting for an April Fool’s Day release. We shall see if I make it.
BradNotes subscribers get an exclusive sneak peek at Muffin Man: Day 1, the first 75 pages of the first draft, and an email notice when the book comes out. Sign up by sending an email to BradNotes@BradWhittington.com.
You can catch the first page here.
UPDATE 1-5-2012: I ate the muffin. It was more like a mini chocolate cake, very moist and quite good with medium roast Columbian coffee made strong. Num!

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2011 Reading List

  1. **** The Art of Fiction, John Gardner, 1983
  2. *** Angels Flight, Michael Connelly, 1999
  3. *** Void Moon, Michael Connelly, 2000
  4. *** That Old Cape Magic, Richard Russo, 2009
  5. ** John Gardner: Literary Outlaw, Barry Silesky, 2004
  6. *** A Darkness More Than Night, Michael Connelly, 2001
  7. *** City of Bones, Michael Connelly, 2002
  8. *** Lost Light, Michael Connelly, 2003
  9. *** The Narrows, Michael Connelly, 2004
  10. *** The Closers, Michael Connelly, 2005
  11. *** The Lincoln Lawyer, Michael Connelly, 2005
  12. *** Echo Park, Michael Connelly, 2006
  13. *** The Overlook, Michael Connelly, 2007
  14. *** The Brass Verdict, Michael Connelly, 2008
  15. *** The Scarecrow, Michael Connelly, 2009
  16. *** 9 Dragons, Michael Connelly, 2009
  17. *** The Reversal, Michael Connelly, 2010
  18. *** The Fifth Witness, Michael Connelly, 2011
  19. The All-New Real Estate Foreclosure Short-Selling Underwater Property Auction Positive Cash Flow Book, Chantal Howell Carey and Bill Carey, 2009
  20. Buying Real Estate Foreclosures, Melissa S. Kollen-Rice, 2003
  21. How to Buy Foreclosed Real Estate for a Fraction of its Value, Theodore J. Dallow, Don Ayer and Dick Pas, 2008
  22. The Complete Guide to Locating, Negotiating, and Buying Real Estate Foreclosures, Frankie Orlando and Marsha Ford, 2007
  23. Foreclosure Investing for Dummies, Ralph R. Roberts with Joe Kraynak, 2007
  24. The Pre-Foreclosure Property Investor’s Kit, Thomas J Lucier, 2005
  25. ** American on Purpose, Craig Ferguson, 2009
  26. ** Little Green Men, Christopher Buckley, 1999
  27. *** The Mystery of Children, Mike Mason, 2001
  28. *** We Need to Talk About Kevin, Lionel Shriver, 2003
  29. *** A Fine Dark Line, Joe R. Lansdale, 2003
  30. *** The Portable Landsdale: Sanctified and Chicken Fried, Joe R. Lansdale, 2009
  31. The Art of Detection, Laurie R. King, 2006
  32. A Grave Talent, Laurie R. King, 1993
  33. *** The Career Novelist, Donald Maass, 1996
  34. * The Hawkline Monster, Richard Brautigan, 1974
  35. ** No Way to Treat a First Lady, Christopher Buckley, 2003
  36. ** American on Purpose, Craig Ferguson, 2009
  37. ** The Art of War, Sun Tzu, 512 B.C.
  38. *** The Throne of Fire, Rick Riordan, 2011
  39. *** Resurrection in May, Lisa Samson, 2010
  40. **** The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie, Alan Bradley, 2010
  41. *** Son of a Witch, Gregory Maguire, 2005
  42. **** Back On Murder, J. Mark Bertrand, 2010
  43. *** The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane, Kate DiCamillo, 2006
  44. *** Savage Season, Joe R. Lansdsale, 1990
  45. *** A Monstrous Regiment of Women, Laurie R King, 1995
  46. *** The Two-Bear Mambo, Joe R Lansdale, 1995
  47. *** A Letter of Mary, Laurie R King, 1997
  48. *** Bad Chili, Joe R Lansdale, 1997
  49. *** The Moor, Laurie R King, 1998
  50. *** The Wayward Bus, John Steinbeck, 1947
  51. *** Rumble Tumble, Joe R. Lansdale, 1998
  52. *** O Jerusalem, Laurie R King, 1999
  53. *** The Girl with the Long Green Heart, Lawrence Block, 1994
  54. *** Captains Outrageous, Joe R Lansdale, 2001
  55. *** Pattern of Wounds, J Mark Bertrand, 2011
  56. *** Justice Hall, Laurie R King, 2002
  57. *** Pilot Error, Tosh McIntosh, 2011
  58. *** Vanilla Ride, Joe R Lansdale, 2009
  59. *** A Hole in the Apple, Harley Carnes, 2011
  60. *** The Game, Laurie R King, 2004
  61. *** Kim, Rudyard Kipling, 1901
  62. *** Devil Red, Joe R Lansdale, 2011
  63. ** Cannibal Nights: Pacific Stories, Volume II, Kiana Davenport, 2011
  64. *** Locked Rooms, Laurie R King, 2005
  65. *** The Language of Bees, Laurie R King, 2009
  66. *** The God of the Hive, Laurie R King, 2010
  67. ** Spytime: The Undoing of James Jesus Angleton, William F Buckley Jr, 2001
  68. ** Wine in the Bible, Samuele Bacchiocchi, 2001
  69. **** The Weed That Strings the Hangman’s Bag, Alan Bradley, 2010
  70. ** A Toast to the Holy Ghost?, Kelly Libatique, 2010
  71. *** A History of the World in Six Glasses, Tom Standage, 2005, ***
  72. Should Christians Drink?: The Case for Abstinence, Peter Masters, 1992
  73. * The Biblical Approach to Alcohol, Stephen M. Reynolds and Calel Butler, 2003
  74. *** Bible Wines or the Laws of Fermentation and Wines of the Ancients, Rev. William Patton, 1871
  75. * Cracking the Wine Case: Unlocking Ancient Secrets in the Christian and Drinking Controversy, Scott E. Smith, 2010
  76. *** Drinking With Calvin and Luther!: A History of Alcohol in the Church, Jim West, 2003
  77. *** Diary of a Part-Time Monk, J. Wilson, 2011
  78. *** Bipolar Disorder Demystified, Lana R Castle, 2003
  79. *** An Unquiet Mind: A Memoir of Moods and Madness, Key Redfield Jamison, 1996
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So you want to be a writer

2 Comments

What if on a Friday night someone said to you, “You have this weekend to produce 5,000 words on your latest project.” What would you do?

Everyone in my family would probably shoot themselves at the thought. I would think, “Really? I get the whole weekend to write? Rock!”

Life and the day job intrude too often to allow me the luxury of a full weekend of writing, but this weekend it happened and I hit a vein and cranked out 5,000 words on Muffin Man. Pretty good words, it feels like right now. We’ll find out when I read it over tomorrow.

But if that question fills you with dread instead of ecstacy, you might want to rethink that whole writer thing.

Charles Bukowski said it much better.